Coffee Cups and Cookie Crumbs
by Izaranna
Summary: If all it took was a folded napkin and two strums of a guitar, all romance would be easy. But he wanted more, and she wanted less, so perhaps a couplet would be required too. She wasn't too fussed - things had a way of working themselves out. OCX? Friendship-centric. Pre-Host-Days to End-of-Canon.
1. Soggy Cookies and Lukewarm Tea

_"Are you sure about this Romano?"_

 _"Absolutely not. Now jump_ _!"_

 _"Is my arm supposed to bend this way?"_

 _"Um...probably not."_

 _"Oh. Am I supposed to be crying?"_

 _"Probably."_

 _"Do you see spots?"_

 _"Um...I'll go get uncle Carlo..."_

 _\- Age 4_

* * *

It was like a tornado in a cup—that was the only reason she could think of. She'd been stirring the coffee for about an eternity and a half, no breaks, and that was the only plausible reason she could think of to find it so fascinating.

In the mindless way, you understand.

So she sat there in a blue soft sweater, her short hair tickling her chin, and watched the coffee swirl in her cup.

Round and round it went, and she could almost imagine drowning someone in it—though there were precious few people she would like to drown. Incidentally, one of them was sitting three seats diagonal to the cash register, his back to her, but that was neither here nor there.

Quite firmly, it must be said.

No, Rosina had absolutely, one hundred percent decided that she was not going to hold onto this bitterness. It dampened her mood, frightened her hysterics-prone mother, and gave her father unnecessary headaches. As far as she was concerned, Silvio could chuck his fancy motorcycle in the Tevere, suffer from unsightly moles and have his hairy legs waxed by Estella at three o'clock in the morning. It was, as the saying went, no sweat off her back.

So the coffee swirled in her little china cup.

* * *

Rosina was what one might call wealthy.

Her soft sweater and plain brown skirt may tell you otherwise, especially with those clunky boots she insisted on wearing, but she was actually very wealthy. Her parents insisted on her admitting to this fact every once in a while, and nine times out of ten, Rosina would happily comply.

It was the one time out of ten that led her mother to want to ship her off to a prestigious high school somewhere in Asia, the one time out of ten that kept her darling father awake at night, the one time out of ten that had led her to accept Silvio's hand as he led her on an adventure through the alleys of Rome.

Because Rosina was wealthy, and she was happy with her wealth, and she wouldn't give up her life for the world, but there are some things money cannot buy.

For instance, the feeling of being drenched by the neighbour's sprinklers as you chased a stray football, or the sense of accomplishment as you handle yet another midnight raid of your friend's kitchen while her parents are asleep without getting caught.

It was the little things that reminded Rosina that being wealthy was a privilege, and that happiness didn't always mean having more, but rather, making do with less.

But here Rosina was, terrifying her mother with her disheartened sighs, causing yet another headache for her father as she moped, and making the servants flinch as she walked past them with a cloud of gloom hanging over her head.

"Dear, maybe you should talk to her."

Rosina sighed and took a sip of her morning tea. Her father shuffled the newspaper in an absentminded attempt to hide from his wife's anxious glance.

"Darling, you're her mother."

Rosina glumly took a bite out of her cookie. Some crumbs fell onto her lap, and that began the end.

"Rosina," her mother began, scandalised. "You can't let the cookie crumble! You must stay strong! You mustn't let this _Silvio_ get to you! You must go to Tokyo!"

Rosina brushed the crumbs off her lap and took another bite, just as glumly as before.

"Dear!" her mother exclaimed, her voice teetering on the border of hysterics. "Your daughter is being difficult!"

Her father took a moment to decipher the tiny writing in the comics section, before giving it up as a bad job and refocussing his attentions to the crossword.

"Yes darling. Rosina, listen to your mother."

Rosina dumped the remainder of her cookie into her tea and watched it sink with a mindless fascination.

Her mother wrung her hands together in nervousness.

"Rosina," her mother nearly cried. "I will immediately get Carlo to book you the first flight to Tokyo! The Romano family sent their son—you remember Giovanni, don't you Rosina? Dreadful troublemaker, always writing that frightful poetry of his, scared me half to death—to this wonderful school, and now he's a proper businessman, isn't that right dear?"

Her father gave up the crossword for a lost cause and took a peak at the horoscopes.

"Of course darling."

Her mother turned back to Rosina, making plans without a single deterrent. "The change of pace will do you good Rosina, I know it will, and that _Silvio_ will be out of your mind in no time, sì? Of course! Oh, I must make arrangements! Your father and I have some odds and ends to take care of, but the sooner you leave Rome behind, the better! I will arrange everything with Carlo, yes Rosina?"

Rosina was far too busy excavating her mushy cookie from the teacup to find the energy to reply. Her mother seemed not to have noticed that no one was paying attention to her, however, and simply continued without missing a step.

"I will send Lia with you—yes, it will all work out, and you might find inspiration for your artwork as well!"

Rosina fleetingly thought of reminding her mother that she hadn't picked up so much as a crayon in the last fourteen years, much less a passion for artwork, but she was having too much fun sulking to do so.

Her mother was all bright eyes and excited fluttering by the time Rosina had finished her lukewarm tea and her father had moved onto a magazine.

"—right dear?"

He put the magazine down just then, looked around the room once as if to reassure himself that everything was in order, before turning his sharp green eyes to Rosina.

"Your mother is under the impression you are fluent in Japanese, honey. Are you going to disabuse her of such notions or should I?"

Her mother gaped at her husband. "Dear! Surely they are civilised!"

Rosina poured herself another cup of tea. She picked up another biscuit and contemplated it thoughtfully.

"I'm sure I don't know what you mean darling." Her father rubbed his temples in the classic post-morning-tea-headache indication.

Her mother touched her perfectly neat brunette bun, as if to reassure herself that it was still in place. "Why, all civilised people speak Italian, surely!"

Her father looked at his wife with something akin to condescension. "Darling, they are Japanese. They will, therefore, primarily converse in Japanese."

Her mother gaped, as though this was a shocking revelation, and not simple common sense.

Rosina decided that the whole cookie could be dunked into the tea—more dramatic that way—and she proceeded to do just that.

She then looked up, and asked, "Don't all roads lead to Rome?"

Both her mother and father exchanged despairing looks, one hysterical and one exasperated.

"Honey," her father said, his voice indicating that he was resolutely holding onto the last vestiges of his patience. "That, in no way shape or form, means that you can learn Japanese in time for the new school year. More than that, a boy should not make you run away from home, for _any_ reason."

"Besides," her mother said, now thoroughly against her daughter leaving Rome, "that's far too—adventurous and tiresome, isn't it Rosina?"

Rosina's eyes sparkled, and she picked up another cookie, her interest sparked with the word.

 _Adventure_.

A few crumbs fell onto her lap, and Rosina had made up her mind.

"Adventurous sounds interesting."

Her father massaged his temples and her mother whimpered.

Rosina took a sip of her soggy-cookie tea.

* * *

 _Tevere_ \- the river Tiber.


	2. Gingernut Cookies and Panama Coffee

_"Lia, why does mother think the stars will answer her prayers?"_

 _"I don't know Rosina. Why do you think they will not?"_

 _"Because they're balls of compressed gas that will eventually die."_

 _"Ah, but that's what 'stars' are. You see, true stars aren't the scientific ones."_

 _"True stars?"_

 _"Sì, true stars."_

 _"What are they Lia?"_

 _"They are tiny gems, glittering with hopes and dreams."  
_

 _"Really?!"_

 _"Oh, I almost forgot the best part!"_

 _"What?! What is it?!"_

 _"It's what makes them special you see. They're glued to the sky with_ magic."

 _\- Age 5_

* * *

It took till two ticks into two o'clock for Rosina to declare Japanese an impossible language.

She blew irritably at a piece of hair and reached up to tuck it behind her ear, her sharp green eyes glaring at her instructor.

"Professore Vitelli," she huffed irritably. "It's no use. Japanese is gibberish, and I will not be wasting my time on it any longer."

Her instructor, a man with an unfortunate double chin and large, insect-like eyes, coughed with apprehension.

"Signorina, please, have patience. It will all become clear soon enough," Vitelli said, forcing himself to be patient, his face flushing a rather unflattering shade of purple.

But Rosina, for all that she adored the idea of an adventure, wasn't really all that motivated to learn a foreign language that had an entirely different form of script _and_ societal rules. There was just so much to _learn_ , and she only had a month to get everything right—being a lady meant certain things, and one of them was being smooth and articulate in any formal setting, which required her to have more than just a basic understanding of the language.

Judging by how this was going, Japan would have to wait a million years before Rosina di Neri set foot on its soil.

"I refuse. Thank you for your time." Expecting that to be that, Rosina rose from her study table—a white oak 17th century gem that had been in her family for generations, its gilded edgings still glinting in the sunlight, even after all these years—and lightly cat-walked to the door, her slippers gently slapping the ground.

She tried the door, understood it to be locked, and, with as much dignity as she could muster, she strode back to her seat, adamantly sure that she _wasn't_ pouting.

"It seems I now have very little choice in the matter. Lia," Rosina informed her instructor with an edge to her voice, "has, I'm sure, been informed of the particulars. Proceed Professore Vitelli. I will speak to her after the lesson."

"As you wish, Signorina."

He proceeded to train her diction into a close approximation of nativity, but for all the hours she'd put into this, her Italian accent was still very heavy. Three weeks of this, and Rosina was at the end of her tether.

If the ninety-six basic characters weren't bad enough, the kanji had her pulling her hair out of her head—she had calligraphy brushes floating around in her nightmares, threatening her with all sorts of demonic 'ka's and 'ji's, laughing at her in her mother's breathless way.

The only upside to this torture she'd brought upon herself was that she no longer obsessed over Silvio and his stupid grins and wide-eyed shock as she kissed him for the first time, or his annoying habit of whistling when he was nervous that had become so endearing along the way, or the idiotic way he referred to her as 'sposa mucca', cow bride, or the way he made her heart beat fast and strong, like she was alive for the first time in her life, and—

Well, she didn't obsess over it _too_ much, at any rate.

And she _especially_ hadn't been keeping close tabs on his new girlfriend, and was adamantly _not_ planning where to bury her body after all was said and done.

Professore Vitelli droned on in the background as Rosina ran a hand through her chin-length chocolate-brown hair consciously, wondering whether, if she'd been a redhead, Silvio would still love her…

She shook her head, but the need to cry hadn't quite left her.

Her mother and father had no idea why, after nearly a month since their break-up, she still felt so miserable.

"Pining," her mother had said, "is unbecoming Rosina. Oh, my poor nerves!"

Her father had looked so lost when he'd caught her bursting into tears at the sight of a tea cup in the display cabinet, and all Rosina could do was sniffle and pat him on the arm comfortingly, telling him she would be fine.

And she would be.

She _would_ be.

Lia wouldn't settle for less, after all.

* * *

Lia Biondi dusted the shelves and hummed to herself, her white hair neatly tucked into a blue cloth, her wrinkled face pleasant, her jolly disposition hiding her advanced age.

Lia had been in charge of Signorina Rosina since the girl was but an infant, and Lia fancied that she knew quite a sight better of what was and wasn't good for her charge than even the girl herself—a change of pace would be wonderful for the girl, and she'd heard how that Giovanni boy had converted from something he called 'emo' to an upright young man that polite society could be proud of.

Now, of course, she had never really heard about this…Ouran Academy, not until three weeks ago, when she'd been informed by her distraught Signora that Rosina wanted to run off to some foreign backwater land without 'thinking of my poor nerves!' Lia hadn't quite known what to make of it, and she was both grateful and smug about the fact that Signora had ensured Lia would be in charge of Rosina, in the very likely eventuality that her parents wouldn't be able to live with her for a while.

Lia moved onto the next shelf, mentally reminding herself to acquire a few photos of that Silvio character, and to discreetly order one of the kitchen boys to empty a can of worms into his pillowcase.

Lia would _not_ let that boy live it down, breaking her Rosina's heart like that.

Humph.

At any rate, those pictures would be acquired and placed in strategic locations so that Rosina would see them when her attention in her lessons started to wander.

Lia, by hook or by crook, wouldn't let Rosina fail—if incentive was required, Lia would _give_ her incentive.

She hadn't raised four children and three grandchildren without learning a few tricks, after all.

* * *

A month later, Rosina di Neri was hugging her parents goodbye.

She had a messenger bag slung across her shoulder, fit to burst with books in Japanese—she'd gained a heady enthusiasm for Japanese history in the past week, after Professore Vitelli had deemed her 'acceptably eloquent', leaving her with strict instructions not to let her knowledge rust.

That meant that meddlesome Lia had ordered a truckload of books in ancient and modern Japanese on every subject imaginable, and Rosina had had to read her two pages and translate them every morning and evening.

In the process, she'd discovered Lady Murasaki Shikibu's _Tale of Genji_ , and from there she'd been hooked on Japanese literature in the Heian period, learning more from her excited foraging than from Professore Vitelli any day.

Her mother had been, incomprehensibly, horrified.

"Oh, Rosina!" she exclaimed, fluttering nervously, "Japan…it is terribly far away, sì? Are you certain this is a…wise decision? Only, you might…no, I've decided, you are not going, understood?"

Her father placed a calming hand on her mother's head, and she stilled. "Darling, she won't forget that Italy is home. That, you have no reason to worry about."

Rosina nodded, a smile gracing her face. "Mother, we will only be apart for half a year. Then you will have arrived, and I will have so many things to tell you about! Now, I think Enzo is tired of holding my luggage—arrivederci mother, father! I will call you when I arrive!"

With a pat on her head from her father and a sobbing caress from her mother, Rosina climbed the stairs to her private jet, Lia and Enzo in tow.

The rest of the servants had left a few days ahead to prepare for their mistress' arrival, and Enzo, an elderly butler with a steady hand, handle-brush moustache, lean frame and soft smile, heaved her last minute luggage into the compartment while Lia took out her knitting needles and bag of yarn, and Rosina quickly kicked off her clunky shoes and sighed in contentment.

"How long is the flight, Lia?" she asked curiously, leaning over to look outside the window as the seatbelt sign flashed on.

"Eleven hours and forty-five minutes, if all goes well, Signorina," Lia answered, in her usual no-nonsense tone.

"And if it doesn't?" Rosina asked mildly, beckoning Enzo forward.

"Then it will take longer."

Rosina did not reply to this unhelpful answer, instead saying to Enzo, "I would like a cup of Hacienda La Esmeralda, two sugars please."

By the time her cup of expensive but soothing coffee had been handed to her in a tall bright red mug, a dark green vine decorating the base and handle, the plane had taken off and she'd waved her parents goodbye from the window.

Thanking Enzo, she placed it on her personalised armrest and took out a copy of _Kokoro_ and an Italian to Japanese dictionary, ready for the long trip to Tokyo.

Enzo took his own seat at the front, leaving Rosina and Lia to their chosen diversions.

Four hours later, Lia had knitted two scarves, and Rosina had shut her book, coffee having been drained a long while ago.

She got off her seat and walked around for a while, trying to get rid of the uncomfortable numbness that came with sitting in one place for too long.

"Signorina," Enzo called, "would you like another cup?"

Rosina shook her head in the negative. "Perhaps after lunch."

Enzo bowed, each strand of his salt-and-pepper hair perfectly in place. "Would Signorina like her lunch now?"

She glanced at Lia, who nodded, and said, "I would like something light. The air makes me queasy."

With another bow, he went to the front to prepare their meals. Rosina sat back down, wondering what Tokyo would be like, and what her new school would be like, and whether she would make more friends than enemies, or if she would get too homesick and come back almost immediately after landing.

Rosina also wondered whether…

…well, it seemed silly but…

She wondered whether she would be able to make any _real_ friends.

Oh, not that she had had problems making _good_ friends, but she meant the kind that she'd read about. The kind that would give their life for yours, the kind who you had the happiest memories of, the kind that became family after a while, the kind who knew you better than you knew yourself, the kind you knew better than _they_ knew themselves.

It was a strange thing to wish for, she realised. Silvio had never—

Well, it didn't matter what Silvio thought about her dreams and desires. He was certainly in no position to be fulfilling them anymore.

"Do you think I will like Japan?" she asked thoughtfully.

Lia's needles continued clicking. "Perhaps it will take a while, but nothing suggests that you _won't_ like it."

Rosina hummed. "I don't look very Asian."

"That is because you are Italian, through and through."

Rosina waved away this obvious piece of news. "Yes, if you don't count my Greek heritage. That is not what I meant. I've heard they look very indigenous, and I'm worried I will stand out far too much."

"There is nothing wrong with standing out."

Rosina knew this intellectually, but the fear of being ostracised for her looks was present nonetheless—luckily, she would be joining classes in the beginning of the year, and in the beginning of high school as well.

Yes, there would be students that continued on from the attached middle school division, but there would still be enough 'new' students joining the high school division that she wouldn't stand out in that respect.

Still, she hoped that people would get used to her soon enough, because being the centre of attention had never been her style, and she didn't much want that to change. Besides that, she would be spending three years with them; the staring would get old, and fast.

* * *

The mansion her parents had acquired, she mused as she munched on a ginger-nut cookie, was aesthetically pleasing enough, but too far away from her school for her to walk to.

Hopping into the limo, Lia standing at the mansion's entrance to bid her goodbye, Rosina smoothed away any small crinkles on her pastel yellow uniform, tightened her pink bow, and ran a hand through her brown hair, one side held back with a yellow topaz-encrusted clip her mother had gotten her from a business trip in Turkey.

Her bag was next to her, filled with the appropriate books and time-table, although she would find out which class she was in at the Entrance Ceremony she was heading to.

As it was an elevator school, the prior year's third year middle schoolers received their timetables on the last day of school, while the newbies received it when they requested a tailored uniform after passing the entrance exam.

Rosina had given her exam in Rome and had received her documents almost immediately after. This was a week ago, and now, a day after landing in Tokyo, she was joining her new school, the cherry blossoms blowing in the breeze, the soft white and pink petals littering the streets, and the sky a serene fluffy blue.

"We're here, milady," said the driver, opening the door for her.

Rosina's first glimpse of Ouran Academy was dazzling; the tinkling fountain, the sprawling gardens, the riotous colours, the well-kept path, the charming clock tower, the powdery pink behemoth of a school…

It was so very delicate, and yet so refined, that Rosina had to catch her breath when she first looked at it. Truly, it was a sight to behold.

"Milady," a woman in a tailored servant's uniform smoothly said, lifting a hand to her heart and giving Rosina a short bow, "if I may, allow me to escort you to the venue of the entrance ceremony."

Rosina curtsied politely and followed her escort to a courtyard of sorts, where several students mingled and chattered politely—some seemed to have known each other personally, others a little more impersonally (likely due to family connections), while others seemed aloof.

"Milady, your class listings are on the board to the left. Beyond that, if you follow the crowd, you will reach the assembly room when it is time for the ceremony. If that is all, I bid you a good day."

With that, the woman left, leaving Rosina to her own machinations.

She approached the large board placed almost centrally, her head held high and her new school shoes lightly tapping against the pavement. She had a genial smile on her face, her eyes glittering with muted enthusiasm, as she searched the board for her name.

She was ever so pleased to realise she could read the names on the board almost as easily as if they were written in Italian, and amused herself for a short while trying to decipher all the different kanji for people's names.

Eventually, she started looking for her own name, and found it to be listed under Class 1-A, right above someone named Haninozuka Mitsukuni.

For a moment, she puzzled over reason for why her last name, which they'd taken simply as Neri instead of di Neri, would be _above_ Haninozuka when alphabetically it should be far apart. Then, it dawned upon her that it wasn't done alphabetically at all.

The 'na' row came before the 'ha' row, and _that_ was why it was so.

She blew a piece of hair out of her eyes in irritation with herself and tucked it behind her ear.

Well, she thought, it's to be expected. I can't simply expect the normal rules to apply when the culture is different.

A bell chimed musically from within the school, and slowly but surely, according to height order, all the students filed into lines like clockwork. There were four lines, and it took very little time for her to realise they were lining up according to classes.

She quickened her pace and made her way to the line furthest to the left, asking a black-haired girl with unfortunate buckteeth and heavily eye-shadowed eyes, "Excuse me, but is this the line for Class 1-A?"

The girl stared at her wide-eyed for a beat before responding with a negative. "It is the one furthest to the right."

"Thank you." With a smile, she almost ran to the other side of the courtyard, grateful that her footsteps were soft enough that she didn't draw too much attention to herself.

Sidling into the line between two girls with black hair, Rosina sighed inaudibly in relief. The line began moving at a steady, elegant pace, and stopped in front of large ornate mahogany doors, the Ouran Academy crest engraved into its fine workmanship.

Passively, Rosina noticed that her line was ahead of the other three, and she easily concluded that it meant that Class 1-A had the more privileged students in it.

Ceremoniously, the doors swung open and bright lights filtered in through the large, ceiling to floor windows, the glass so clean it looked as though there was nothing there.

There was a podium on a raised platform at the front, and four rows of chairs for the audience arranged diagonally, spaced in such a way that, no matter where in the room you sat, the podium was always visible.

A tiny boy, probably an elementary student, was sitting on a cushy chair on the raised platform, a look of pinched determination on his face.

Rosina followed the girl in front of her and sat down when the seats in front of her in her 'row' were occupied, quite pleased with the lighting and comfort of the chair.

A man in his mid-thirties—although he looked quite handsome, so perhaps he was in his forties—smiled benignly at the students as they filtered into the assembly room, looking as though there was nothing else in the world that pleased him as much as the fact that they were filing into the room.

Immediately, Rosina recognised him as Suoh Yuzuru, head of the Suoh conglomerate and chairman of Ouran Academy.

When everyone was seated, Chairman Suoh said, in a deep affectionate voice, "Welcome to the high school division of Ouran Academy! To those who have been at Ouran from the very beginning, I thank you for continuing your studies in these hallowed halls—clearly, we're doing something right!"

Some polite titters across the room, but Rosina grinned; she liked this man, who seemed to easily blend gentility and congeniality without sounding forced at all.

"To those who do not know Ouran like the back of their hands, fear not—in only a few short weeks, Ouran Academy will become so familiar, it will be as though you had always been a part of it. I hope you bear yourself with the proper poise and conduct expected of our school, and uphold its good name here and beyond. I will now hand over the podium to the top scorer in the entrance exam—Haninozuka Mitsukuni, Class 1-A."

He stepped off the platform to a smattering of applause, and Rosina waited for someone to stand up from her row and go up to the platform.

Instead, to her massive shock, the boy she had previously pegged as an elementary schooler got off his chair and went to the podium.

He's a _high schooler_!?

Suffice to say, she heard not a word of his speech.

* * *

 _She is the same age as Mori-senpai and Honey-senpai. Now, keep in mind that this is before the Host Club - two years before, in fact. This is also the year Tamaki joins Ouran, and this means that the hosts are not 'popular', but are actually misfits - according to Wikia and other musings. This means that they will be out-of-character until the Host Club is formed, and even then, it will take time to get to what they were like and how close they were by canon standards. I hope that doesn't turn anyone away! This is more of a 'character assessing and developing' sort of story._


	3. Lemon Crinkle Cookie and Caffè Macchiato

_"This isn't very fun father."_

 _"This is very fun. You just need to let yourself have fun."_

 _"But I'm bored."_

 _"This is a party honey. If you are bored, do something entertaining. Preferably for all of us."_

 _"So I can smash that ugly bust of Abraham Lincoln and get away with it?"_

 _"Only if you pout convincingly."_

 _"And I won't get in trouble?"_

 _"Honey, it will be an unfortunate accident, correct? Now hurry, before Juan Maritnez makes another toast to bore us half to death."_

 _-Age 6_

* * *

The classroom they were led to by their class teacher was all rich mahogany and dappled sunlight. Rosina was quite impressed, but that was neither here nor there.

There was a seating chart attached to the blackboard at the front, and when some of the students filed closer to see it, Haninozuka Mitsukuni joined them, looking as though he'd run all the way. The students started sitting down, and immediately, Rosina could see that the four of them were related—perhaps cousins, although she didn't know their family name. They all had the same upturned nose and high cheekbones, complete with jet-black, curly hair.

She found her seat (sixth row, middle column) and sat down, and a moment later, Haninozuka sat in front of her.

She wondered whether it would be appropriate to introduce herself first, not knowing whether he was higher up in the food chain than her, but the tiny person made her decision for her. He turned around and gave her a subdued but friendly smile.

"Hello," he said, in a rather forced husky voice. "I'm Haninozuka Mitsukuni. I don't like sweets and I ha-hate bunnies."

Rosina stared at him until he started fidgeting in his seat. "I am Rosina di Neri. I prefer spicy food, and I have no ill will towards bunnies."

He almost smiled, but seemed to school his features to prevent that. "You're half-Japanese?" he asked after a delicate pause.

"No, I'm fully Italian," she replied with a friendly smile, to show him that she wasn't offended. "I take it not many foreign students come here then?"

He shook his head. "No…um, well, there are a few, but they're seniors. Halfers are more common, but I mostly asked because there's one in the middle school section. Half-French. He's the chairman's son, so I kind of—"

He stopped himself from going any further, having realised that he'd let his husky voice slip. "I mean," he began again, trying to sound manly, "I've seen him, and he looks very French, so I thought that maybe you were half-Italian. Sorry."

He seemed to have rambled himself out, turning away and sighing. Rosina thought he was rather sad—it seemed he wasn't the most social person, and he was trying to act tough when he wasn't.

"No harm done," she said. "You went here for middle school?"

He turned back to her, surprised. "Um, yeah. Since elementary school actually. But don't worry!" he said hurriedly, his fake husky voice slipping slightly. "It's really easy to belong here, once you get used to the classes. And you're really nice and pretty, so it should be even easier for you."

He smiled at her, without a hint of embarrassment. Ah, so he wasn't just another shy stereotype then. But if so, why was he pretending to be manly?

Rosina's cheeks coloured at the compliment. "You flatter me. But thank you."

With that, a bell rang, and he turned around after flashing her another smile.

A girl sat behind her, a girl and boy sat on either side of her, and then the teacher began roll call.

Rosina tried to look at the blackboard but…she raised her hand.

"Yes, Neri-san?" asked the middle-aged, brown suit-clad, glasses-wearing teacher with a hopeful beard.

"Sensei, I can't see the blackboard."

This wasn't all that surprising considering that there was a six foot tall giant sitting in front of Haninozuka.

"Ah, yes. I see the problem. Warunato-san, is it possible for you to swap seats with Morinozuka-san?" he said politely, talking to the girl behind me. "I apologise for the inconvenience."

"That's Morinozuka?" asked the boy to Rosina's right in shock. "Man, that's some growth spurt!"

"Shut up Akio," the girl to Rosina's left hissed. "He'll _hear_ you."

Rosina made a mental note to steer clear of Morinozuka, the six foot giant with wild hair and brooding eyes, who was lumbering past her desk to sit behind her heavily.

"If there are any other problems…" their teacher paused. "Well, let us begin then. For those of you who do not know me, I am Maki Hiroto, Masters in International History and Foreign Relations, Med, MA and etc. I will be covering your history lessons, and will be writing your references for university, should you be heading down that route, in three years' time."

He gave a short bow, and the class got up—Rosina following suit a few seconds after—and bowed back to him.

"As we will be together for the next three years," he continued once everyone was seated, "introductions are in order. If we could start with the far right, name, favourite subject, parent's occupation, birthday and future career should be fine."

The girl who got up was a shy little thing with an irritating stutter, her dark brown hair in a low ponytail. "M-my name i-is Arata Ch-chiyaki. I like c-chemistry, my m-mother owns a m-modelling a-agency and m-my father i-is a model. My birthday is o-on O-october the fourth. I-I w-want to become a m-m-mod-del."

The names came and the introductions snaked across the room, column to column, until it came to her column, starting from the back.

The really tall boy said, in a deep, frightening voice, "Morinozuka Takashi, Japanese history, my father is the Head of the Morinozuka Family, 5th May. Take over from my father."

 _A man of few words then,_ thought Rosina, and as he sat back down, she vowed to stay away from him and his intimidating expression.

With her turn having come up, she informed them that her name was Rosina di Neri, with Neri an acceptable form of address, that her favourite subject was maths, that her father "dabbled in several businesses, ranging from toy-making to fire-arms", skipped over her mother's housewife status and informed them that her birthday was on the second of July, "a day before the end of the school year".

"And as for my life goal, I," she concluded with an even, jovial tone, mindful of how _wrong_ her accent was in Japanese, "would like to _live_."

The girl to Rosina's left snorted derisively; clearly, her accent hadn't endeared her to anyone in the room.

Haninozuka stood up abruptly and rushed out a string of syllables too quick for her to catch—his birthday was in February, he liked maths (or Greek, but she couldn't really figure out what he'd said, and his forced husky voice wasn't helping matters), he wanted to…do something about pigeons?

No, no, he said engineering, she was quite certain.

At least, she _hoped_ he wanted to be an engineer—becoming a pigeon didn't seem like an appropriate goal somehow.

The girl in front of Haninozuka went next, clearing her throat and saying in a cheerful voice, "Warunato Mimi. I love Spanish, my mother works at the Mexican embassy, my father is a politician, and after graduating, I want to work at a corner shop in Mexico!"

A horrified silence descended on the class.

The boy to her right, Akio, suddenly started snickering, and soon, loads of people started laughing, some cruelly, and others taking it as a joke. Rosina, however, focused on the way Warunato's eyes lost their glimmer, and the way her smile became forced.

She wasn't the only one. "I think you should be able to be whatever you want to be," said a quiet voice that cut through the laughter.

Everyone turned to look at Haninozuka, who was looking at Warunato unflinchingly.

Something in Rosina's heart jumped at that expression of serious determination, but just as soon as it was there, it passed, leaving her to wonder whether she should have had a more substantial breakfast.

Warunato blushed and sat down. Akio glared at Haninozuka and hissed, "That's rich, coming from someone like _you_."

Haninozuka's shoulders hunched but he didn't retaliate.

Rosina pouted contemplatively.

Clearly, there was a lot she was missing.

* * *

It had been three hours since her gingernut cookie and Rosina was ready to eat a horse and a half. Instead, she sedately followed everyone to the dining hall after her Economics lesson, wondering whether there was a limited choice in cuisine.

She was happily dissuaded of such notions when she entered the opulent dining hall, polished tables gleaming under the chandelier light, a serving counter at the front with mouth-watering dishes artfully displayed, butlers lining the wall in their crisp uniforms, and a swinging door presumably leading to the kitchen, steam pouring out in little puffs and wafting the scent of something spicy and faintly sweet into the room.

All in all, Rosina loved it.

She perused the menu as she waited in the conveniently short line, and decided to play it dangerous the first day; she ignored the Italian cuisine available and plunged headfirst into quintessentially Japanese food.

"Can I have the E platter with the A drink please?" she asked, careful to keep the overflowing eagerness out of her voice.

The bespectacled black haired man behind the counter taking her order lost his smile momentarily. "Miss…you would like the natto platter? That's…"

"Is that a problem?" Rosina asked. The man quickly shook his head and informed her that her food was ready at counter C.

She made her payments and got her tray; the several small dishes—a bowl of steaming rice, some long green papery thing, a carefully covered bowl of some sickening beans, assorted vegetables—was such an unapologetically Japanese thing that Rosina felt her giddiness begin to rise.

"Miss, here is your drink," said a butler formally, holding out a serving tray with a caffé macchiato, the strong coffee scent beckoning her.

She gave him a polite smile and he placed it on her tray, giving her a short but deep bow.

Rosina then faced the most challenging task of the day and, indeed, her entire scholastic career. Where would she sit?

Already clusters of acquaintances were forming; those that were new to the school were mingling with the other years that had flooded the hall, most of the long tables allowed for large groups to close ranks and not let anyone else in unless they wanted to be publically humiliated, and Rosina knew no one.

Living in Europe meant she had very little interaction with her father's Asian associates, in part owing to the language barrier, and that meant that she had no acquaintances at Ouran Academy—a fresh slate.

An adventure.

Rosina squared her shoulders, smoothed her hair down while balancing her tray, and took a confident step towards the closest table, where not many people were sitting.

There were the four cousins from her class (that looked so very similar to each other) sitting at the far end of the table, whispering among themselves moodily, occasionally glancing at someone on the other table and laughing raucously.

A bit closer to her, but not by much, sat a brooding boy in a dark cloak, body masked from view. Everyone seemed to be going out of their way to avoid him.

Rosina di Neri was never one to forget her curiosity. Besides, her food could wait—she wanted to drink her coffee first, and she didn't feel like drinking without company today.

She moved her tray closer to him and offered a perfunctory smile. "Hello. Are you new here as well?" she asked, tone perfectly polite.

The boy started so hard that he knocked his tray onto the floor and then, completely randomly, burst into angry Russian (Rosina, her Russian a bit rusty from disuse, thought she heard something about a curse and mind games, and she decided that maybe it was something she didn't really want to know), and fled the dining hall with a cloak-sweep of dramatic origins.

Rosina, her shoes splattered with lobster sauce and her cup of coffee held stiffly in her hands, blinked in surprise.

"Are you okay?" asked a quiet voice, and Rosina snapped out of her daze.

"Sì, quite well, thank you," she said, turning to the speaker.

She immediately wished she hadn't.

Hulking over her and darkening her daylight stood Morinozuka, the one that had apparently had an insane growth spurt over the summer and evolved into a truck-crushing vodka-chugging Yakuza boss.

Rosina wasn't one to judge a book by its cover, but just _looking_ at Morinozuka was intimidating.

"Neri-san, you've got sauce on your nose," said a forced husky voice from somewhere near Morinozuka's knee, and it was only then that Rosina registered that Haninozuka had been there the whole time. "Here; to wipe the sauce off."

He handed her a napkin with a small smile that he quickly wiped off his face for whatever reason. Rosina thanked him and dabbed her nose with it.

The four cousins at the head of the table pointed at her and said something that she couldn't hear, but whatever it was made Haninozuka thin his lips.

"What did they say?" she asked curiously, crumpling the napkin and putting it on her tray.

Haninozuka said in an annoyed tone, "Nothing that anyone with a modicum of decency ought to say."

Rosina smiled forcedly. "I see," she said rather unnecessarily, and then saw their hands filled with trays and asked, with only a slight tremor when she realised that Morinozuka would be included in the invitation for politeness' sake, "Would you like to join me for lunch?"

Haninozuka looked up at Morinozuka, and a silent communication must have passed between them before Haninozuka shook his head rather ruefully. "It's probably better if no one thinks we're friends Neri-san, but the offer is appreciated."

Rosina frowned but then nodded; so these two were social outcasts that were aware of their own isolation and didn't want to bring anyone else into it—they were rather kind to do so, and she was rather disappointed that these two weren't higher up the food chain. She would've enjoyed getting to know them better. However, it did stand that being a foreigner already put her at a disadvantage, and to make the right sort of connections, one had to acquaint themselves with the right sort of people; it was what any good businesswoman ought to think of first.

"If you think it best," she replied diplomatically, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.

Haninozuka and Morinozuka took their leave and Rosina was alone again.

Deciding against forging any other friendships—her heart could only take so much rejection in one day—she took a sip of her coffee and smiled immediately.

It tasted rather like home.

As she took another sip, someone tapped her on her shoulder.

She turned to see the cloaked boy hovering behind her, and she bit back a scream. Barely.

Without a word, he shoved a cookie in her hand, mumbled something in speedy Russian (it sounded like a hymn to ward off evil, for some bizarre reason) and then said, "An offering. In return, spare me."

With that, he left as quick as he'd come.

Rosina shrugged, pretending that she couldn't hear the people whispering about her, and took a bite out of her newly acquired cookie.

Mmm. Lemon crinkle.

* * *

 _Sorry for the delay in updates! I genuinely had no idea what I was doing with this chapter, so it came out slower than its predecessors...thoughts? How are Honey-senpai and Mori-senpai? Reviews are very appreciated! :)_


	4. Chocolate Chip Muffin and Bar Cappuccino

_"I wonder what hides in the clouds."_

 _"Nothing Rosina."_

 _"Use your imagination mother."_

 _"You can't use what you shouldn't possess."_

 _"...that's very sad. Grandpa said you shouldn't have an imagination?"_

 _"Oh, my poor nerves!"_

 _-Age 7_

* * *

It was the end of the day and jetlag was quickly pulling Rosina under, wave by wave of sleepiness hitting her harder and harder with every word their International Politics teacher said. Her voice was droning, her explanations dry, and quite frankly, she would prefer forming her own opinions on politics of all things, not what Ueda-sensei seemed to think was correct.

She stifled a yawn, however, never one to make teachers that weren't directly hired by her parents think that she was being disrespectful.

The bell chimed, the beginning notes of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star if she wasn't much mistaken, and the class began packing away their things. Thinking that she was scot-free, she moved to leave, hoping she'd be the first one out, but she was sorely disappointed.

Ueda-sensei called out, "Neri-san, if you would stay behind for a moment."

She blinked at Rosina with simpering hazel eyes, so she sighed internally and smiled at the woman, sitting back down.

When everyone had filed out, Haninozuka giving her a backward look of confusion before being whisked away by the throng, Ueda-sensei said, "Neri-san, as I understand it, there's a matter of a language barrier between us. The chairman, of course, has made provisions for those disadvantaged in that respect, and has offered afterschool Japanese lessons to pick up a deeper appreciation for our language if you are interested."

Rosina was not amused. She'd spent the better part of a month getting a firm and unwavering grip of the language, and the fact that she barely had to try to read the notes on the board or understand the teacher was evidence enough that she wasn't 'disadvantaged'.

Outwardly, she politely inclined her head. "Would it be acceptable for me to think on it Ueda-sensei? Only, my driver is waiting for me as I hadn't foreseen any such generous offer, and it is terribly rude of me to make him wait."

Best not to disrespect the most powerful person in the school after all—rejecting his offer immediately wasn't the smartest thing to do.

Ueda-sensei nodded before dismissing her.

Rosina walked down three flights of stairs, wide-eyed at the fact that nearly none of the school population had actually _left_ the school, even after eight lessons!

Truly, the Japanese were very dedicated. Rosina hoped to learn from them.

She got lost getting to the pick-up area, and when she took a turn right and found herself at a door labelled Music Room #3, she may or may not have starting cussing in rapid-fire Italian in frustration.

"Lost?" someone asked with amusement to her left. "That Music Room hasn't been in use in years—not enough students to require its use. I've been lobbying to get it converted to a club room for months now, but everyone is adamant that the Historians and Ouran Enthusiasts for Upper Class Knowledge doesn't need another club room."

Rosina absentmindedly translated what he said to English and Italian, and noted that the abbreviation wasn't the classiest— _Silvio would have snickered and brushed her hair out of her face and held her hands and found a way out of here by now—_ before offering a tentative smile.

"You sit next to me in class, yes?" asked Rosina.

The boy nodded, his cherry-red dyed hair falling into his eyes and giving him a boyish look. "Tsukuda Akio. Our fathers work together occasionally."

Ah, Rosina thought. Of course; she'd met someone with the same angular pale brown eyes before, back when her father hadn't banned her from such gatherings on account of her rather poor choices when bored. The last one had been particularly memorable—she'd destroyed an ivory set of carved elephants from India, worth nearly two billion dollars. Father was _still_ getting headaches about it.

"It's a pleasure to meet you Tsukuda-san," she said with a polite smile, giving him a light bow. "You mentioned a club? Do you run it?"

He nodded, flashing her a petulant look. "Only one new recruit this year, sadly."

Rosina understood finally why he'd decided to speak to her. "That's rather unfortunate. It sounds as if you're very dedicated."

Tsukuda nodded. "Say, the club is a wonderful way of making friends as well. Since you haven't joined any afterschool clubs and they're mandatory, why not join mine?"

Rosina was tempted, truly she was, because this seemed like an easy way to make friends, but the club's premise just didn't interest her, and she wasn't one to go with the flow unless she was perfectly happy with it.

"I will have to think about it. I've never been in such a creatively-named club," she said.

Tsukuda Akio coloured a little. "Ah, yes, well…I let Arisu decide the name, and she has a stupid sense of humour."

"Arisu…Rai Arisu?" Rosina asked, eager to leave but glad to have a conversation with _someone_ —isolation wasn't something she enjoyed.

"Yes; she's a halfer too, half-English, but she's been at Ouran since middle school," he explained, shuffling his feet.

"She didn't look foreign."

"No, she got most of her looks from her mother."

"Her name doesn't sound very foreign."

"Ah, well, her name isn't actually pronounced like that, but I'm terrible at English, so I wouldn't be able to tell you what it really sounds like," he said with a self-conscious smile, "but you could always meet her. I mean, she's at the clubroom right now, if you want to see what the HOEFUCK is like. It'll help with your decision-making, if nothing else."

Rosina couldn't see a polite way of refusing without using the same excuse she'd used with her teacher, but she'd promised herself she wouldn't use the same lie twice unless she had to, so she swallowed her inhibitions ( _this is an adventure Rosina)_ and asked him to lead the way.

* * *

"You brought the new girl Akio? Really?" asked a frowning girl with her dark hair in a loose bun, a beauty mark under her right eye and uniform sleeves rolled up to her elbows.

"A new recruit is a new recruit Arisu," Tsukuda said, pulling out a chair for her like a proper gentleman. "Neri-san, this is Rai Arisu."

There was a third person in the room, a quiet overweight girl who had her nose stuck in a book with a picture of Hitler on the front cover.

"Are you waiting for others?" asked Rosina, placing her bag next to her foot, tucking a strand of loose hair behind her hair.

"No, this is it," said Tsukuda, his pale brown eyes shifting to the window in embarrassment. "Most of the other members graduated last year and we're not very good at recruiting middle schoolers, so it's just the three of us—four if you want to join."

Rosina blinked at the clubroom—it was nice, if a bit lacklustre in comparison to the rest of the school. There was a map of the world pinned to the wall opposite the door, an assortment of chairs clustered in the corner furthest from where she sat, a shelf stocked full of leather-bound books, and a mahogany roundtable where Arisu was sitting, her legs swinging back and forth distractingly.

"This room doesn't look big enough to be a classroom," she said, completely changing the subject without registering she was doing so.

Rai Arisu pushed herself off the table and walked to her, frown still in place. "This used to be one of the changing rooms for the drama club, but they moved to rooms closer to the stage and Akio nabbed this place for us. My name's Alice Rye, and since you seem like someone who can pronounce their L's, call me Alice."

Ah, thought Rosina, that made more sense.

"You sit next to me in class," Rosina said rather unnecessarily.

Arisu's frown deepened. "You didn't find _anybody_ else Akio?"

Tsukuda sighed. "Ignore her Neri-san. She's a bit mental."

Arisu turned to glare at him. " _I'm_ not the one who brought a half-witted Italian to _our_ clubroom."

The quiet girl snapped her book shut loudly and both Arisu and Tsukuda watched her wearily. "Sorry for disturbing your reading Kayo-senpai," he said, smiling nervously.

Kayo-senpai focussed her pitch black eyes on Rosina and just stared for a while.

"Do you have any appreciation for History and the aristocracy?" she asked finally.

"One more than the other," she answered lightly.

Kayo-senpai nodded and reopened her book. "Do you have anything interesting to add to analytical discussions?"

Rosina felt that that was a challenge, and that Kayo-senpai was calling her an idiot. Her pride naturally bristled, she replied with a curt, "More than you, I dare say."

Tsukuda winced and Arisu gave her an appreciative once over.

"So you'll join the club then? I don't waste my words on the unworthy," said Kayo-senpai, looking down at her book.

Rosina clenched her teeth and bit out, "Because you think you're better, or because you were dropped on the head at birth and seem to think intimidation makes you superior?"

"If the shoe fits," replied Kayo-senpai evenly.

Rosina wanted very much to lunge at the annoying girl and fight her the way Silvio had taught her in the back alleys, but she suppressed the urge.

She turned to Tsukuda Akio and said, "Sign me up. I'll _obliterate_ her baseless arrogance."

* * *

"How was your first day of school?" asked Lia, putting down her knitting when the maid let her into the house.

"It was interesting," answered Rosina, rushing upstairs to her room.

When there, she changed into a comfortable cream sweater, an olive green skirt and knee-high socks, putting on silver hoop earrings and touching up her eyeliner and pale pink lip gloss, before rushing out of the mansion.

"Where are you going Signorina?" asked Lia from behind her as she put on her clunky boots.

"I have an ice cream craving that must be sated Lia," she said. "And the cobwebs need to be blown out of my brain."

Lia said, "You have no idea where anything is Signorina."

Rosina turned to flash her a giddy smile, grabbing her purse. "That's more than half the fun!"

* * *

Rosina knew that Enzo was tailing her, but he was doing an admirable job of blending in with the throng, so she allowed it.

She had to walk quite a ways away from her mansion before she came upon a marketplace. Her caffeine craving began singing in her veins, and so the first thing she did was look for a good coffee place.

It took far more searching than she liked, but the shops were filled with interesting things—she would be perusing that novelty shop at a later date more thoroughly, for sure—and the streets were clean, so it was a bearable search.

The people stared at her, and some whispered to each other in rapid Japanese when she turned to look at them, making her feel rather out of place—was it her clothing, or was it her nationality that made them stare?

She self-consciously ran a hand through her chin-length hair, before squaring her shoulders and _choosing_ to ignore them.

She was here to find coffee, and that's exactly what she would be doing.

Oh, and ice cream too.

In the end, she did find a café, although most people seemed to be steering clear of it. Rosina tilted her head in confusion.

She tried to read the kanji on the sign above the shop, but then she realised that maybe she _did_ need the extra Japanese lessons, if for nothing else than to understand what 'okama' means. The word next to it, however, was self-explanatory—it was a bar.

But it wasn't quite night just yet, and the serving staff was an eclectic mix of really pretty women and really ugly women that looked like men in drag.

Curiosity took a hold of her faster than a rollercoaster plunged down a thirty foot drop, and she threw her head back, eyed the signboard as though she understood what she was reading completely, and walked into the shop as cool as you please.

Silvio had been underage, but the amount of alcohol he managed to acquire had once led her to joining him on his forays. She'd discovered immediately that it wasn't the growing stubble on his chin that made people not question his age, but rather his confident, unpractised air as he bought it.

Although she never bought alcohol, the fifteen year old had practised anyway, buying baby care items and complaining to the cashier about her husband and four rambunctious kids.

It took her a lot of trial and error (the _number_ of times she got kicked out of a shop…) but in the end it got to the point where the cashiers really took her for the twenty-five year old that she was pretending to be.

It might have been the growth spurt, or the swelling breasts, but Rosina was quite sure her purposeful stride and unflinching confidence had a lot to do with it too.

She swung the door open, and any sounds that had been coming from within seized abruptly as she entered.

A really pretty red-haired woman in her twenties came up to her, an empty serving tray held close to her chest, came up to her with a friendly smile.

"Hello! Are you lost dear?" she asked politely, a cheerful smile still on her face.

Rosina looked around at the clean counters, the table booths and the photo frames along the walls, the red and white theme, and also, the fact that the clientele was male.

Just male.

Not a woman in sight.

 _Is this a hook-up spot for men?_ she thought, before giving the red-haired waitress a smile. "No, I was just curious about this place, that's all."

Some guy at the back snorted. "Stupid foreigner…"

The redhead turned to look piercingly at the guy at the back and said, "Genji-san, you'll keep your opinions to yourself."

The guy shrunk in his seat morosely, nursing a bottle of saké.

She turned back to Rosina and said, "Well, I can't say why you'd want to come here, but you're most welcome, so long as you buy something."

"Do you have coffee?" she asked almost instantly and the redhead flashed her a bright smile that instantly made Rosina forget about Haninozuka, Morinozuka, Tsukuda, Arisu, Kayo-senpai and Ueda-sensei all in one go.

"Coming right up! What would you like? We have café latte, cappuccino or just regular instant coffee," the waitress asked.

Rosina figured she'd try a cappuccino at the bar, not so keen on the instant coffee (she'd had some when Giovanni, her musically-inclined neighbour, and she had snuck out at 2 AM to have a birthday party for two the day before he had to go off to Japan for school, and it had tasted like dirt), and so she placed her order.

The waitress turned around and gave everyone at the bar a meaningful glare. "Wasn't there something you all are supposed to be doing?"

Immediately, the hustle and bustle picked up again, and a moment later, the redhead waitress came back with a steaming cup of coffee and a chocolate chip muffin.

"Complimentary muffin," she said, winking at Rosina. "We don't get many straight women here."

Rosina wondered if this was Japanese commoner custom, to refer to someone's sexuality in bars. She took a sip of the cappuccino and curled her lips in distaste. When she saw the waitress watching her reaction, she smoothed out her expression and said, "Sorry; I'm a bit of a picky drinker."

The redhead smiled and said, "We're a bar girly, not a café. I'm just glad you didn't spit out."

Rosina decided she quite liked this woman.

"Neri Rosina."

The waitress gave her an amused smile before giving her a short, almost humorous bow. "You can call me Ranka."

It was the start of a beautiful camaraderie.

* * *

"How was your second day of school?" Lia asked as Rosina plodded into the house and flopped onto the sofa in a tired heap of groans.

"I had my first Japanese Literature lesson…I think I'll have to take the Chairman up on his offer."

Lia's knitting needles clicked on. "And what of your afterschool club?"

Rosina huffed. "All they do is sit there and read, and I can do that at home. They don't have debates until the end of the month, so I'm not really missing out on anything."

"And have you made friends Signorina?" asked Lia, looking up at the petite girl with bright green eyes.

Rosina was silent for a beat.

"Perhaps," she whispered.

Lia's needles clicked on.

* * *

 _So, what did you think guys? How was her meeting with Ranka? How were Tsukuda, Arisu and Kayo? She'll be meeting Tamaki next, hopefully! :) Review please?_


	5. Strawberry Cupcake and Tropical Iced Tea

" _Mama, I'm going to be a bird!"_

" _That's…what an absurd career option! Oh, my poor nerves!"_

" _But I wanta fly!"_

" _So you want to be a pilot?"_

" _No! I wanta have wings!"_

" _Darling, your daughter—"_

" _Our daughter."_

" _OUR daughter is being insensitive to my poor nerves!"_

" _But mama—"_

" _She wants to_ fly! _"_

" _Let her do what she wants dear."_

" _Darling!"_

 _-Age 4_

* * *

Rosina di Neri had just taken the cupcakes out of her oven, wearing an Ouran apron in the Home Economics facilities, and put them on the cooling rack to dry, turning to her essay on field mice behaviour and trying to get it all done for next lesson.

She'd failed at the whole not-procrastinating gimmick, and here she was paying the price.

As she scrawled out yet another sentence, she half-heartedly mused that she'd put far too much caster sugar in the second batch.

By the by, she turned back to her cupcakes to separate them before she forgot which ones were which, only to find…

"I'm sure I baked two dozen of each," she muttered to herself, puzzling over the eighteen fluffy mini-cakes with scrunched up eyebrows.

How did forty eight cupcakes, half strawberry jam and half chocolate and hazelnut, go down to nine of each?

She'd only looked away for five minutes…

Shrugging, figuring that she'd somehow forgotten how to count, she carefully placed the sixteen cupcakes onto a display plate and drizzled them warm honey, cut open one strawberry and one chocolate cupcake down the centre and laid the two halves partially on top of each other in the centre, before encircling them with rich cream.

With a practised hand, she crushed some pecan nuts and sprinkled them over the whipped cream generously.

Happy with her presentation, she took it to the front for the teacher to inspect, but as she walked past the last table, someone stuck their leg out and—

Morinozuka came out of _nowhere_ to grab her round the waist to stop her from falling over, and she had a firm grip on her plate of cupcakes, so the only thing that happened was that her topaz clip clattered onto the floor in the hushed silence that befell the chattering class.

"Neri-san, please refrain from causing a scene," admonished Ichiyo-sensei, pencil moustache quivering in indignation.

Face bright red, she apologised and hurriedly placed the plate at the front, shuffling back to her work station.

So drawn into her own thoughts, she didn't notice until he'd poked her shoulder that Haninozuka was standing right next to her.

"Ah," she said, wishing she could say something more intelligent. But being rejected _hurt_ , and she hadn't quite gotten over Silvio's rejection just yet.

"You dropped this," he said in his forced-husky voice, holding out her clip.

"Ah, thank you," she said, taking it from his hand. "And you, Morinozuka-san, for catching me."

She smiled at the now-obvious hulking figure standing behind Haninozuka with a scary expression, trying very hard not to show how intimidated her felt by his presence.

Morinozuka made a noise.

She wasn't sure whether it was a noise meaning 'you're welcome' or 'the Russo-Japanese war happened in 1905'.

With him, it could literally have been _anything_.

"They were really good cupcakes," burst Haninozuka. "I mean," he backtracked, "they looked very good."

Rosina felt a warm feeling tingle in her fingers and toes. "I've been practising a lot. My friend, Alberta, she likes to be my guinea pig, so I've been able to indulge my inner cook." Her smile turned more into a smirk. "Of course, there were some accidents, but the fire brigade was prompt."

Haninozuka almost laughed, but he quickly smothered any mirth and excused himself. "I'll let you get back to your essay. Bye."

Rosina felt like she'd been rejected all over again.

* * *

It was afterschool, and Rosina was waiting outside the second language room for her first supplementary Japanese lesson, an empty bottle of tropical iced tea in her hand. She'd had Akio show her the way, and he'd quickly abandoned her at the end of the corridor, hysterically blaming her for being late and 'please don't kill me Arisu!"

Rosina wondered whether it was normal to be that whipped.

Running a hand through her chin-length dark hair, she knocked at the door smartly and entered, coming upon two rather loud boys mucking about at the back of the classroom.

"Oh, Hokkaido will be lovely this time of year Kyouya-san! The singing songs of the sea, the taste of sea bream! Hokkaido! Hokkaido!" exclaimed the blond one.

The unnaturally good-looking black-haired boy sitting on the desk the blond boy was leaning on said smoothly, "Perhaps we can take a trip there."

"That is a fine idea mon ami!" squealed the blond boyishly, a bright smile lighting up his face. "Maybe I can buy a kotatsu there!"

Rosina didn't want to interrupt them so she propped her bag against a desk closer to the front and took out her Japanese literature textbook, and after a few moments of distraction—they were very hard to ignore—she was utterly consumed by the prose she was reading.

"What a wondrous flower! To have not noticed such beauty immediately is a sin! Forgive me, my lovely maiden!" exclaimed the boy a tad louder than before, breaking Rosina's concentration.

"Scusi? I mean, excuse me?" she asked, looking up and noticing that he was right by her desk.

He gave her a doe-eyed smile and sank to one knee. "My Goddess, you have undone me! With such soft-spoken words, your delicate exquisiteness has befuddled my senses!"

He took her hand and brushed his lips against it lightly. "I am Suoh Tamaki, and what may your fair name be?"

Rosina felt like she was in a play.

"Neri Rosina," she said, giving him a polite smile and extracting her hand from his. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Suoh-san."

"Please, Neri-senpai," he intoned sultrily. "Call me Tamaki-kun."

It was only then that Rosina noticed that the two boys were wearing the middle school uniform, and she quickly made a mental note to keep an eye on it in the future.

"Very well, Tamaki-kun," she said, although there was something in the back of her mind telling her that he was being too forward with the honorifics…oh well, they were both foreign, so they had an excuse, if anyone bothered to ask.

"C'est magnifique! And this is my best friend Kyouya! He's very smart," Tamaki bragged good-naturedly, "and very knowledgeable about nearly any topic!"

"Ootori Kyouya," the good-looking boy said smoothly. "It's a pleasure to meet you Neri-senpai. I trust your parents are well?"

"Yes," she said, already aware that Kyouya was the type of shark that papa had warned her about. "Very. You sister was recently married, yes? How are the newlyweds?"

"Quite well," he said with an Oscar-worthy smile. "They recently returned from a trip to Maldives."

Before they could exchange more meaningless pleasantries, Tamaki cut in. "Are you here for the Japanese lessons as well, mon cœur?" he asked buoyantly.

Rosina blinked. "Yes Tamaki-kun." An unholy need to burst his bubble filled her up, and she glibly said, "Wasn't it obvious from my terrible accent?"

And there, she did it again—she just made herself sad.

"That is true," he said with over-the-top consideration. Then, with such a sharp 180° turn that it gave _her_ whiplash, he exclaimed, "Say spaghetti!"

Rosina gave him a disbelieving look. "Are you five?"

Tamaki pouted and gave her extremely intense puppy dog eyes.

Almost against her will, Rosina murmured, "Spaghetti…"

Immediately, the blond idiot began clapping and cheering, and in spite of herself, Rosina smiled at his antics.

It was very hard to be offended by him, for whatever reason. _Must be the stupid look of his face,_ she mused.

Kyouya stood there stonily, light glinting off his glasses, and Rosina could almost _feel_ the rage exuding from him.

"If you will excuse me, Neri-senpai, Tamaki-san, my valet is waiting," he said, adjusting his glasses and taking his leave with a bow, a practised smile on his face.

Rosina returned his bow and smile, while Tamaki began crying tears of presumably sincere heartbreak at being parted from his 'best-friend-for-life!" (On a completely unrelated note, Kyouya looked like he was contemplating homicide.)

By the time Kyouya finally left the room, their teacher had arrived and, within fifteen minutes of her teaching, both Tamaki and Rosina were ready to call it quits.

"But _why?_ " Tamaki asked for the fifteenth time in a row, pointing at the irregular sentence structure with a vapid expression.

The teacher's left eye started twitching in irritation as she explained it _again_ , but Rosina was still stuck on the mole growing on her neck.

"Does it hurt when you turn your head?" she asked curiously, immediately drawing Tamaki's attention to the mole as well.

"I think it adds to your character," said Tamaki, the compliment taking the teacher by surprise if the blush was anything to go by.

"But does it hurt?" Rosina insisted on asking, pencil twirling in her hand and mind wandering further and further off task.

"Neri-san," said the teacher in a strained voice. "That is irrelevant to this lesson."

"I'm sure it does," Tamaki added his pearls of wisdom. "Beauty is pain, after all, oui madame?"

Rosina wondered what paper tasted like by the time the teacher stopped sputtering.

* * *

"Mitsukuni."

He nearly flinched at the tone. "But the cupcakes were so gooooood! Especially the strawberry jam ones!"

"Mitsukuni."

"She didn't seem to mind!"

"Mitsukuni."

"…I won't do it again."

"…thirty in five minutes. Go brush your teeth."

"Yes Takashi…"

* * *

 _Sorry for the long delay! It just took a while to make this chapter make any sense…I have difficulty writing them all in character, while at the same time making them believably out of character…why did I anoint myself this task? Sigh…but I hope you enjoyed the chapter regardless! And the French stuff is mostly just 'my friend' or 'that is magnificent' or 'my heart'. Nothing too left field. Review please? They remind me that I have to update this story :)_


	6. Irish Cream Lindor and Arabic Coffee

_"Rosina, come down from there!"_

 _"But Lia, you can almost touch the sky from here!"_

 _"Rosina, stop being so fanciful! Anyone would think you were-were—"_

 _"Crazy, Lia?"_

 _"Yes!"_

 _"What's wrong with crazy?"_

 _-Age 9_

* * *

Rosina stretched her worn muscles and got out of bed, reaching for the ivory brush on her side table. She brushed her hair as she mused on the rest of her day, heading towards her bathroom. After feeling that her hair had been sufficiently brushed, she performed all the necessary ablutions and exited, just about when Lia's favourite apprentice arrived with her breakfast.

"Will miss need anything else?" she asked dutifully, in accented Japanese.

"My bag is in the study room," she said. "Take it to Enzo please."

"As you wish, milady," she said, turning and exiting.

Rosina pinned her hair up with her topaz clip and donned her uniform, making sure the bow was appropriately centralised, and then left the room.

"You will be late," said Lia, dusting the display cabinet, "coming home from school?"

Rosina nodded as she gratefully accepted the cup of tea proffered to her. "Japanese lessons after school again."

Lia tilted her head in acknowledgement. "Have a pleasant day, Signorina."

"And you, Lia."

On her way to the limousine, tea cup in one hand, Rosina noticed two figures walking down the streets—a tall boy and a very short boy.

Instantly, she ducked into the limousine and told her driver to step on it.

The tinted windows ensured that they couldn't see her, so she, almost in spite of herself, trained her eyes to the window for the moment she passed them. Haninozuka was talking to Morinozuka, a strained smile on his face and bags under his eyes. Rosina thought he looked rather pale, and she was rather worried about him.

But then she shook her head to clear it of such thoughts—they weren't friends, and it was best to keep her distance.

Her heart sunk a little, though, as she remembered the dullness of his ought-to-have-been happy eyes.

She wanted to be friends, really she did, but courage wasn't something she possessed in excess, and she didn't think she had it in her to ask again.

* * *

Rosina di Neri wrote down the last kanji on the board into her notes with a pained flourish, grinning triumphantly as she managed to copy everything down before Amaya-sensei wiped the chalk off.

It had been two weeks since she'd started going to the supplementary Japanese lessons, and she decided that she was actually very grateful, because it _had_ been useful.

Not that she would ever say it out loud, of course. Pride was a thing.

Not to mention, any lesson with Tamaki in it made it ten times better, what with his added insanity and frequent delightful tangents.

The twinkle-twinkle chimed to signal lunch and the class all stood up to thank the teacher, before traipsing off in twos and threes, or, in her case, ones.

Despite wishing that she could have, well, _any_ friends, Rosina had quickly found out that, barring Alice and Akio, no one wanted much to do with her, and today, the latter was sick and Alice had gone off with her other friends.

Rosina had not been invited along.

Still, she squared her shoulders, dusted off her yellow uniform, and headed out the door.

The mahogany furniture glinted in the sunlight cascading through the large, tall windows, and for a moment, Rosina forgot her loneliness – how could anyone be alone in such a beautiful place?

But then reality crashed down upon her, and she sighed, rubbing her temples wearily. She knew it would be difficult to integrate herself, especially in such a close-knit community where she had no ins, but she didn't think it would be _this_ difficult!

 _An adventure,_ she reminded herself, _sometimes it begins with a misadventure._ She would not go home just yet.

The dining hall was as opulent as ever, with classical music playing softly in the background and clinking cutlery melding with the din. She walked up to the food waiting line and gave the room a once-over.

There were nineteen long tables spread across the hall, and the entire high school division was present and accounted for. The middle school students had their dining facilities next door, while the elementary division had theirs closer to their classes, almost halfway across the campus.

Closer to the door sat the loudest, rowdiest of the lot, third years if Akio was to be believed, and they were currently guffawing at something their leader had said.

Beside their table sat the group of the most eligible females at Ouran, their princess, Ayanokoji Seika, an elegant first year in Rosina's class with blue eyes and reddish-brown hair.

Before she could properly observe all the clusters that Akio and Alice had pointed out to her, it was Rosina's turn to order.

"What would miss like today?" asked the serving lady, smiling indulgently at her. "Perhaps the C option?"

Forgetting herself, Rosina clapped in delight. "That will be lovely, Mari-san! With the E dessert and the A soup?"

Mari-san gave her a pleased smile. "Right away, Miss Neri. And you'll be having Arabic coffee today?"

Rosina smiled beatifically, and Mari-san complied.

At least Rosina had made one proper friend at Ouran.

The short-haired brunette sat down gracefully at her usual seat, and looked down her rather forlorn table. At the far end sat Haninozuka and Morinozuka, one chatting a mile a minute to the other in a low voice, and Rosina quickly looked away. Somewhere halfway between her at the other end and them sat the dark-cloaked Russian that Akio and Alice had trembled just to look at, who was quietly muttering what sounded like dark curses to a cat puppet.

This was the table, Rosina understood, that the outcasts sat at.

Alice was sitting with her three female friends at the table one over, chatting amicably and sipping on mock turtle soup with great delicacy, delicacy she usually forewent when eating with Akio.

"Not that we're friends or anything," Rosina muttered to herself, "but it's rather rude that she didn't even ask me to join her."

Akio was her tentative friend, but both of them were, of course, only acquaintances, and they'd known each other far longer than they cared to let Rosina know. Some things, like those kinds of precious friendships, were untouchable.

She wouldn't know. She'd never made lifelong friends like that.

"Here you are, Miss Neri," said Mari, smiling, with her dark hair wrapped in a cloth bun and her light brown eyes glinting with happiness. "Your Arabic coffee."

She placed a small glass cup on a saucer in front of her. Rosina delicately inhaled the spicy aroma before smiling happily at the staff member who enjoyed her love for traditional plain Japanese cuisine and eclectic coffee orders just as much as she did. "Thank you, Mari-san!"

Before she could take a sip, however, there was a commotion near one of the windows. Curiosity overtook any propriety, and Rosina headed towards the crowd that had already gathered.

"What's going on?" she asked, sidling towards Alice, who always seemed to know these kinds of things.

Alice was trying to see over the top of some people's heads, her soft hair falling into her eyes. "Ikimara Rin is going to confess to the Hitachiin twins."

Rosina had no idea who Ikimara Rin was, but apparently, this was a huge deal. "Er, who?"

Alice gave her a mildly annoyed look. "Come on, Rosina-chan, _Ikimara Rin?_ Third year? Last year's winner of the Otaka prize for best orchestral composition?"

No, Rosina had no idea, but that didn't mean she couldn't pretend. "Ah, of course. Right, and her confessing is a big deal because?"

The girl next to Alice, whose name Rosina didn't know, whispered in a deliciously secretive manner. "The Hitachiin brothers are still in _middle school_ , and they've never said yes to _any_ girl! No one knows how they reject them, but it always leaves the girl in tears!"

Rosina blinked. "She's confessing to both of them?"

Alice rolled her eyes. "Doesn't matter which one she's confessing to. Personally, I think they're both in an incestuous relationship—"

The girl next to her gave a sharp, high-pitched giggle. "Oh, _imagine_! A Hitachiin sandwich!"

Rosina wasn't quite sure what to make of this, but figured the boys in question must have been quite good-looking to garner this kind of attention.

All the windows she could have been able to peek through were blocked by humans, but she remembered that there was an unused art room that had windows that overlooked the quad where the 'legendary' confession was to take place.

Rosina was as curious as a cat. She'd never seen _twins_ before, except on TV.

She sneakily, or very obviously depending on who you were asking, left through the dining hall doors and speed-walked to Art Room #4, hoping that the spectacle wasn't over.

She shiftily looked side to side, adrenaline pumping through her system as she slipped into the room, unbearably grateful that something had come up to break the monotony of her boring lunch hour.

She reached the tall, thin windows bathing the room in warm sunlight and peered out of one, scouring the quad with her eyes. She noticed two ginger heads at the archway that connected the middle school to the high school and went on her tippy toes to see properly.

"Maybe, if I unlatch the window…" she muttered to herself, but then realised that the latch was too high for her to reach.

She looked about the empty room, pouting at the lack of chairs, and then decided to put her roof-climbing skills to good use. She braced both her hands to the side walls of the window and heaved herself up, balancing precariously on the sill. Reaching as far as her arms could stretch, she brushed her fingers against the latch.

Rosina, for the first time since arriving to Japan, cursed her shortness.

Going on her tippiest tippy toes, she managed to nudge the golden latch open, and then pushed the window pane with the tip of her fingers, letting in the sultry breeze into the room.

Rosina realised that, if she was the clumsy or balance-challenged type, she'd have fallen out the window.

As it stood, Rosina was very good at balancing on precarious footholds, and was able to hear the unmistakably young voices of two boys, and the tearful cries of a girl.

"If either one is fine," one boy voice said, "then you should have seen this coming. You're the worst kind of girl, absolutely shameless."

"Besides," the other voice chimed in, irritation colouring it far more than the first one, "what kind of person does it make you, being okay with one or the other? What kind of 'pure-hearted' confession is that? _Disgusting."_

"P-Please…" Ikimaru Rin whimpered. "S-Stop…I'll leave…so, please…"

One of the Hitachiin brothers scoffed. "Go, run away and cry like a pathetic baby. But don't expect any sympathy from us."

Rosina heard a strangled cry and then clicking footsteps running away. _Ouch,_ _and I thought I was dumped harshly…_

"Hey," one of the brothers said to the other, and Rosina realised with a start that they were having a private conversation. She felt conflicted. To eavesdrop, or not to eavesdrop?

Luckily, she heard their departing footsteps before she could make a decision, but not before hearing his trailing voice saying, "I'm just about fed up with this, you know?"

"Same here," muttered Rosina, before mentally stomping on her own foot to get rid of the pessimism.

She took a deep breath and closed her eyes, leaning further out the second floor window and letting the sunlight fall on her face, the light breeze playing with her bangs.

It was so calm, that when a voice screamed, "Neri-san!" she nearly toppled over and fell out of the window.

As luck would have it, strong arms wrapped around her waist and yanked her back inside the room, though not before the blood rushed to her face and her heart started beating like a cornered rabbit.

She turned around to see Morinozuka placing her stoically on the ground, before retreating behind Haninozuka, who'd yelled loud enough to startle her.

His normally pleasant face was screwed up in a passable attempt at furious, though his inherent cuteness wasn't helping. "What were you doing, Neri-san!? You could have fallen out the window – you nearly _did_ fall out the window! If Takashi hadn't caught you…" he yelled, before petering out and taking a few deep breaths.

Rosina wanted the ground to swallow her up.

It was awkward enough that this was the second time in so many weeks that Morinozuka had saved her from falling, but this was also the first time she'd spoken to either one of them since they'd rejected her friendly overtures, and she'd done a brilliant job of avoiding them ever since, though they sat in the same column, one in front of her and the other behind her.

"I-I wouldn't have fallen if you hadn't startled me," she said, her little kindling of anger sparking. "Who even does that when someone's leaning out the window?"

Haninozuka pouted angrily. "Who leans out a second-storey window?" he shot back.

"Me!" she exclaimed angrily. "There's no rule against it!"

And maybe it was misplaced anger, but it _had_ been festering. It wasn't _just_ hurt she'd experienced from his rejection, after all.

"Common sense says you don't do stupid things like that!" Haninozuka yelled back, and somehow, Rosina got the feeling it wasn't just her he was yelling at.

"Oh yeah?!" she said, glaring. "Well maybe I like doing stupid things! Maybe I _am_ stupid!"

And suddenly, Rosina made herself sad again.

Haninozuka yelled, "Don't call yourself stupid!"

"Why!? Cause it's your job!?" she yelled back, her green eyes glinting.

His honey eyes seemed remarkably more golden as he glared back at her. "That's not even a job!"

"Yeah, well—what?" she said, looking confused.

Haninozuka blushed, losing all his fiery temper. "Er…I don't know…I said the first thing that popped into my head," he said, smiling sheepishly, before remembering himself. "But that was really dangerous, Neri-san!"

Rosina was losing all her anger too. "I really _was_ fine until you startled me, Haninozuka-san," she said again, and then smiled. "But thank you anyway. It would have been much harder getting down on my own."

Haninozuka giggled. "Yeah, Takashi's really convenient, ne? Like a crane."

Rosina laughed, but then peeked at Morinozuka's stoic face and wondered if he'd taken offense. It was really hard to tell with him.

"Er…" she said.

Haninozuka seemed to understand what she was getting at. "Oh, don't worry! Takashi doesn't mind – he's really hard to offend!"

Rosina still felt he was extremely intimidating though.

"By the way, Neri-san, what were you doing?" Haninozuka asked, tilting his head cutely in confusion.

Rosina, rather shamelessly now that she thought about it, replied flippantly, "I was spying on Ikimara-san and the Hitachiin twins."

Haninozuka blinked at her. "Why? Do you know one of them?"

Rosina shook her head. "I don't know anyone, really. I was just curious. I've never seen twins before, but the angle was bad, so I still couldn't see them. They were really mean though. Is that normal?"

Haninozuka smiled sadly, and something about that expression made Rosina's heart skip a beat.

Maybe she had a cholesterol problem?

"Hikaru-chan and Kaoru-chan are…well, they can be not-very-nice, but I think that they're just lonely," Haninozuka said earnestly, his eyes wide with honesty.

Rosina leaned against the wall and sat down, getting comfortable. "You know them well?" she asked curiously.

Haninozuka folded his legs and sat down two steps away from her, and Morinozuka followed suit, although he looked very awkward, even if his expression was as blank as ever.

Rosina thought it made him look less intimidating.

"Yeah," Haninozuka said, nodding. "The different years mix more at primary school, and they're only two years younger than us. They've always kept everyone at an arm's length, so it's not really surprising they were mean."

She frowned mildly. "What do you mean?"

Haninozuka explained patiently. "They're not so good at talking to people, because they haven't had enough practise. And I think they've built it up in their heads so much that they're different and better than everybody that they get disappointed when other people prove them right."

Rosina absorbed this information. "Oh...Are they really identical?" she asked eagerly.

Haninozuka giggled. "Ne, Neri-san, you're really cute."

Rosina blushed to the roots of her hair.

Haninozuka continued on as if it wasn't the first time she'd been complimented by a boy since Silvio nearly three months ago. "They really are. I still can't tell them apart, and I've known them for seven years now."

Rosina recovered quickly as she shot question after question at him. "Are they naturally ginger? Are you good with face recognition? Ah, are they Hitachiin, as in the world famous fashion designer Hitachiin? Is Ayanokoji a _real_ princess?" She took a deep breath as he giggled at her enthusiasm, asking warily, "Why are you talking to me?"

He froze for a second, before saying shyly, "Well, um, I…you're fun to talk to."

Rosina felt something warm curl up inside her, like a sleeping kitten. "Good enough for me! So? _Are_ they really ginger?"

Haninozuka looked relieved that she wasn't asking about his strange 180° change of heart, largely because she was too eager to finally have someone who didn't look annoyed with her questions.

But also because Haninozuka had a nice smile.

"They really are," he confirmed, nodding. "I think I'm okay at face recognition, but if you mean that maybe that's why I can't tell them apart, even their mother can't tell them apart most times, and yeah, she _is_ the world famous fashion designer. Um, Ayanokoji-chan really is a princess too!"

Rosina's mouth fell. "No way! A real Japanese princess?"

Haninozuka nodded happily. "Yeah! When she first came here in middle school, there were rumours that she'd been kidnapped by yakuza when she was a baby, so her parents had to hide her away. But Akio-san was pretty sure she'd been abducted by aliens, and that they'd found out how mean she was and sent her back."

Rosina blinked. "She doesn't look mean…"

Haninozuka shrugged. "Most people don't, and most people aren't. I think Ayanokoji-hime just doesn't know how to be nice, even though she wants to be."

Rosina said, without thinking, "You're one of those genuinely nice people, aren't you?"

Haninozuka looked at her in surprise. "Huh?"

Rosina nodded, sure of her opinion now. "You're a really good person from the inside," she informed him, giving him a warm smile. "And you really care, don't you? About everyone? That's why you're so good at seeing it from their perspective."

Haninozuka flushed, and Rosina thought that was sinfully adorable. "Not _everyone…"_ he mumbled, studiously avoiding her gaze.

Rosina laughed, and then slowly, carefully, taking a deep breath, she stuck a hand out at him and said, "Haninozuka-san, can we be friends?"

He had said no before, but that was back when he thought she could make friends with other people, people who weren't social outcasts. And back then, Rosina had thought that that had mattered.

But two weeks of loneliness had made her realise that, well, it didn't really matter. Well, it _did_ , but not enough.

From the minute he'd talked to her on the first day of school, Rosina had an inkling that she wanted to be friends with him, an inkling that she'd only ever had once before, when she'd taken a sip of her first coffee brew and felt _complete._

And, well…

"I'd rather be friends with you than a thousand Ayanokoji-sans and Arima-sans," she said determinedly.

And if she had the option, she knew she'd stick by that decision – Rosina wanted _real_ friends for once, so maybe it was time to shake things up a bit and make friends with people she never would otherwise.

Haninozuka slowly took her lightly tanned hands and shook it with his warm ones, giving her an unendingly bright smile. "I'd love to be friends, Neri-san!"

The bell chimed, signalling the end of lunch.

"Ah!" she exclaimed, standing up so abruptly that she dragged Haninozuka up with her. "I haven't had my lunch! And my coffee!"

She looked so stricken and saddened by this that Haninozuka quickly rifled through his blazer pocket and plucked out the last sweet in his stash.

Gulping in sadness and promising himself he'd buy more in secret to replenish the stock when Takashi wasn't looking, he held it out for her. "Here, have this before PE. I'll sneak some food from the kitchen before Maths, okay?"

Rosina looked at the Irish cream Lindor he held out for her. Her stomach grumbled, and she took it gratefully. "You don't have to sneak me any food," she said earnestly. "I can handle it!"

Haninozuka tilted his head at her. "Aren't you hungry?"

"Not enough to get you in trouble," she said, plopping the imported chocolatey goodness in her mouth. "And we'll be late to PE at this rate!"

Haninozuka, Morinozuka (who'd kind of just…been there…) and Rosina ran to the dining hall to get their things, Rosina looking mournfully at her cold coffee, and then legged it to the changing rooms near the sports hall.

For the first time since coming to Ouran High School, Rosina was late.

For the first time in her life, Rosina didn't mind.

* * *

"She's nice."

"Yeah, I thought so too!"

"You gave her your last sweet."

"She was hungry."

"Mitsukuni..."

"Yeah, Takashi?"

"I'm glad you've made a friend."

* * *

 _Rosina and Haninozuka are friends! The Hitachiin brothers were…er…there? God, this is going slow, isn't it? I'm really sorry for the long delay in updates! I just…forgot I had to update this story…? *sheepish grin* Until I got a review today, and suddenly, it was like,_ Izaranna, you haven't updated! _And I couldn't stop typing! Longer chapter to make up for it, hopefully!_

 _Was it good? Subpar? Meh? Please let me know!_


	7. Forgotten Pecan Plait and Vanilla Latte

" _I don't think this is a good idea, signorina…"_

" _Nonsense, Alberta! No one will notice a difference."_

" _But…signorina, we don't look anything alike."_

" _Shh! It worked in the movies, so it can work in real life!"_

" _That…I don't think that's true, signorina…"_

" _Oh, Alberta, this is why_ I'm _the signorina, and you're the servant. Now, quickly, wear this wig! You're going to be me for the day, so you have to at least look the part!"_

"… _as you wish, signorina."_

 _\- Age 7_

* * *

Rosina hummed a jaunty tune as she made her way to Okama Bar, wearing an off-shoulder cream sweater and olive green jeans. Her signature small leather messenger bag was bobbing at her hip, containing a small snack for herself and imported Hibiscus tea – while she loved Ranka-san's company, her workplace's menu had a lot to be desired.

As she stepped into the red-and-white bar and slid into her usual booth, the woman at the bar, Fumio-san, greeted Rosina with her usual grunt. She smiled back, waving merrily, before taking out her chemistry homework and getting to work.

The bar was usually only mildly crowded, but today, it was rather more rambunctious than usual. Rosina didn't know why, too focused on her work to really notice anything else.

"Ah, Neri-chan!" cried the familiar voice of Ranka-san, breaking her concentration. She looked up to see the upbeat red-haired woman waving to her from the middle of the rapidly forming crowd.

She waved back, wondering what was going on. "Good evening, Ranka-san!" she called back with a smile, putting her pen down.

Ranka-san broke out from the middle of the crowd, dragging a beautiful brunette girl with her who couldn't be a day older than twelve.

"I see you're back again," said Ranka-san, sliding into the booth facing her. "Have you met my little bundle of joy? The light of my life? The apple of my eye?"

"Dad, I think she gets it," said the brunette girl with a deadpanned look.

Rosina, had she been drinking anything, would have done a spit-take. "D-Dad?!" she exclaimed, jaw dropping.

Ranka-san nodded cheerfully. "I thought you might not know! Your expression is so cute, Neri-chan!"

"He likes to tease," said the brunette apologetically. "You must be the Italian girl he was talking about – Neri-san, right? I'm Fujioka Haruhi. It's nice to meet you."

The brunette gave her a friendly smile, and Rosina felt unaccountably happy. "T-That's my name!" she stuttered, completely blind-sided by the girl's adorableness.

Then, realising what had just happened, she uncomfortably glanced at Ranka-san. "You…you're a …"

She didn't know the Japanese word for transvestite – funnily enough, it had never come up.

Ranka-san's smile seemed to become a bit fixed as she – _he_ – cheerfully replied, "Yup, I'm a transvestite."

Haruhi frowned in thought. "Neri-san, you do realise this is an okama bar, right?"

Rosina felt her head spinning. She'd been meaning to look up the meaning, but it kept slipping her mind. It hadn't seemed important before. "Er…I don't know what that means," she admitted, swallowing her pride. "I just thought it was a type of animal or something."

Ranka-san burst into laughter. Haruhi shot her – _him –_ an exasperated look. "This is not the time to be laughing, dad! She's confused!"

She turned back to Rosina. "Really sorry about him. My dad's an idiot."

"Haruhiiiiii!" Ranka-san wailed. "How can you say that about your loving papa?!"

"Easily," replied Haruhi glibly.

"Neri-san, why is my daughter so mean to meeeee?" Ranka-san whined.

No matter how many times Rosina blinked and squinted, it was no use; Ranka-san still looked like a pretty woman.

"Er…because you deserve it?" tried Rosina, still blinking and squinting. "What kind of make-up do you use?"

Ranka-san lit up like a puppy with a dog bone. "Oh, well, I do a bit of mixing and matching – for contouring, I use –"

Haruhi sighed, sitting down for the long haul.

Little by little, Rosina grew more comfortable with the new information that her friend was actually a male tranny. But that was alright – Ranka-san was more used to people rejecting him completely, so this was a refreshing change.

They spent an hour exchanging make-up tips while Haruhi sat doing her own homework. The poor girl was still in her middle school uniform.

"So why are you here today, Fujioka-san?" asked Rosina curiously. Her blinks had reduced to three per minute instead of the previous fifteen.

Haruhi looked up from her homework, which looked to be suspiciously like maths. "Oh. The neighbour that usually looks after me went to visit her sister for a few days, so dad brought me to work. Without telling the manager. Again."

Rosina muffled a laugh at the girl's resigned look. "Ne, you're really cute!"

Ranka-san beamed. "Isn't she?! My Haruhi-chan is the cutest girl in the world!"

"Dad!" said Haruhi in embarrassment, doe brown eyes standing out even more with the blush on her cheeks.

But Ranka-san ignored this, instead turning to Rosina. "I know you don't have many friends at school, Neri-chan, and Haruhi doesn't have any female friends – which makes papa very sad – so I thought you both could be friends!"

Rosina and Haruhi exchanged a look, though Rosina didn't know what to think. Haruhi was…well, she seemed pretty down-to-earth, and her smile was really cute, but…

 _She's too pretty_ , thought Rosina in shame. _I don't know if I can handle that._

And she couldn't. Sometimes, when you look at a person, you just _know_ whether you can handle being around them, and as much as Rosina liked Ranka-san, and knew that his daughter would be equally as nice, if less flamboyant, she knew her limits.

Maybe a year or two ago, she would've had the self-confidence to manage, _maybe_ , but now?

Rosina didn't know how to politely say no thank you.

Luckily for her, Haruhi did it for her. "Dad, you can't just _make_ me make friends with people. Besides, Neri-san is older than me, and she goes to a different school. We don't have much in common."

Rosina let out a breath she didn't know she was holding in. Ranka-san pouted. "Haruhiiiii, I'm only trying to help!"

"Ne, we can always talk if she's here and you're working, Ranka-san," she said. "Which, you know, you should be doing right now, yes?"

Ranka-san sheepishly looked back at Fumio-san, who was giving her – _him_ – a pointed glare. "Ah, I'll leave you two to bond. Coming, Fumio-san!"

An awkward silence engulfed the pair of petite girls, and Rosina attempted a genial smile, though she didn't think she pulled it off all that well.

"So…how old are you, Haruhi-san?" she asked.

"I'll be thirteen this February," she replied. "How do you like Japan?"

Rosina smiled, thinking about her new friends and the clean sidewalks and the sultry spring that was lazily sweeping away the cobwebs from her mind. She thought about the History and Heritage Appreciation Club (they'd changed the name at her behest) and her afterschool Japanese classes with Tamaki-kun. She thought about the fountain bubbling at the entrance of the school and the rose garden maze at the back.

"I love it," she said, smiling beatifically, emerald eyes dilating in happiness. "It's everything I never knew I needed."

Haruhi smiled back at her. "I'm glad. It must be jarring to be away from your home country."

Rosina's smile dimmed as she thought about her anxious mother and headached father, of Giovanni with his proud grin and lithe fingers on a piano, of Alberta and her sweet tooth and dimpled cheeks, and of summer days and cobbled streets and cherry tomatoes and loud booming laughter merging with the din of raucous chatter.

"It…has definitely taken getting used to," said Rosina. "But sometimes, you need a change to learn to live again, and that's what I…what I'm trying to do."

She felt a weight settle in her heart like lead, and her mood was utterly spoiled. Maybe she should go home and get Enzo to make her a cup of espresso and chocolate. That always made her feel better.

"I'm sorry if I brought up bad memories," said Haruhi awkwardly.

"It's alright," said Rosina, though it really wasn't. But she couldn't exactly blame someone who wasn't at fault, could she? "I should be used to it by now."

They both, by unspoken consent, went back to doing their homework, and by the time an hour had passed, she'd managed to get all her homework done, along with some Japanese literature reading.

"I'll see you around, Neri-san," said Haruhi politely, bowing.

Rosina gave her a sleepy smile, ready to have a nice long bath before going to bed. It had been a long day. "Bye bye, Fujioka-san. Bye Ranka-san!" she called.

It wasn't until she got home and heard her stomach grumbling that she realised she'd completely forgotten about the pecan plait Lia had given her to eat, and the Hibiscus tea too.

She pouted irritably, before shrugging.

It wasn't until she slipped under her cream covers that she let the image of Silvio, with his straight white teeth and striking blue eyes, his rough hands and soft words, his irritating whistle and stubbly cheeks, completely ensnare her mind like they'd been threatening to do since she'd thought about her Italy.

Rosina hated herself for the tears.

She should be _over_ this by now, surely! Silvio was…he was _nothing_ to her. Just a boy who'd broken her heart – who'd promised her the world and lied, lied through his teeth. Lied because he'd said he wanted nothing more than Rosina, and ended it with a harsh, "You're not…you're just _not_. And I've been waiting, god I've been waiting, but you're never going to change. You'll always just…disappoint."

Rosina hated herself for letting his words affect her so much.

But how could she not? She'd admired him so much, wanted to be like him, wanted to laugh and breathe and believe in life like him, and…

And she wasn't…just _wasn't_. She didn't know what it was she wasn't, but the words kept ringing in her mind.

It wasn't fair how much of a hold he had on her, how much of her had been _him_.

Rosina stared at the canopy of her bed in the dark light coming from her window, and let the tears fall out of the corner of her eyes with a choked laugh, because what else could she do?

* * *

Rosina woke up, determined to have a good day, and spent an inordinate amount of time soaking in the shower, going overboard on the vanilla hair conditioner, and spending more than ten minutes brushing her teeth.

She applied a coat of mascara on her eyelashes, pale pink lip gross on her lips, and clipped her topaz-encrusted hair pin to her hair.

It took her two minutes to get her dress on, and then another two for her socks, bow and bag.

By the time she got to the front entrance to put on her shoes, Lia's little apprentice handed her a freshly made vanilla latte and a buttered croissant.

"Does signorina need anything else?" she asked.

Rosina shook her head, plastering a smile on her face. "Thank you. How long till school starts?"

"You have thirty minutes, signorina," she replied dutifully. "If you would like me to, I can take your breakfast to—"

She was cut off by the doorbell.

No one had visited her since she'd arrived here save a few acquaintances of her father's business colleagues, but none came so early in the morning.

"Are you expecting someone, signorina?" asked Lia, coming to the foyer, a crinkling frown on her face.

Rosina leaned into the door curiously, looking through the peephole.

She gasped, before hastily unlocking the door.

"Haninozuka-san! Morinozuka-san!" she exclaimed, her mood brightening instantly. "What are you doing here?"

Her honey-blond classmate was grinning at her, equally enthusiastic, while his stoic shadow…stoic-ed in the background?

"We're walking to school together," stated Haninozuka in a faux-husky voice, not saying it as a request but more as a fact of life.

She'd always wanted to walk to school with friends!

She beamed brightly before sending Lia a pitiful look. "Can I walk to school with my friends, Lia?"

Lia frowned, eyeing the two Japanese boys coolly, probing them with her laser eyes. When Rosina was little, she'd thought for sure that Lia was one of the mafia dons or, even scarier, a mafia don's _mother_.

"This is Haninozuka Mitsukuni," Rosina introduced belatedly in Italian, figuring that she ought to have done that first. "And this is Morinozuka Takashi. They're both in my class, and they're really nice."

Turning to them, who were standing at her threshold politely, she said in Japanese, "This is my nanny, Lia."

"It's nice to meet you, Ria-san," Haninozuka said, bowing cheerfully. Rosina internally giggled as he stumbled on the L.

"Signor," said Lia, bowing shortly, not understanding a word he had said. "Enzo will follow, signorina."

Rosina sighed before nodding, and then smilingly took the croissant and vanilla latte from Lia's stunned apprentice, who was staring at Morinozuka with a blush on her face.

"Let's go," she said, bracing her messenger bag on her left shoulder with a smile on her pale pink lips. "I walk pretty slowly."

Together, the three fifteen year olds walked to school, with Haninozuka chattering about their classwork and their teachers.

"Ueda-sensei's really strict, ne?" he grumbled. "She's given us so much homework!"

Rosina nodded frantically. "That last essay was overkill – I barely managed to research all the information in time! And all those extension exercises she keeps giving us—"

"It's like she thinks Politics is the only subject we do," nodded Haninozuka. "Maki-sensei though…"

"He doesn't give enough homework," Rosina agreed, wincing. "And he lets the Arata siblings get away with everything, for some reason. Why?"

"I think they're related to him," mused Haninozuka. "I remember hearing something about that when he first started working here a couple of years ago."

"Oh," said Rosina in understanding. "Karina-sensei's my favourite so far though."

Haninozuka giggled, and even Morinozuka cracked a smile.

"You just like her 'cause she called you a prodigy," he said teasingly, his husky voice slipping again.

Rosina laughed. "She was half-drunk. She didn't even remember my name after – it doesn't count!"

Every word that they shared, every laugh, made Rosina happier and happier, till soon, she completely forgot why she ought to be in a bad mood in the first place.

It was absolutely wonderful having friends.

* * *

 _It isn't like I've never had friends before_ , mused Rosina. _It's just that I'm not used to making them on my own._

She had met Silvio through Romano, who was one of Giovanni's friends, whom she had been friends with due to their family connections since childhood. Alberta, though wonderful, was mostly a servant, and Rosina had always felt that that didn't count, though maybe it did.

She'd had several acquaintances, but none of them had ever walked to school with her before. In fact, Rosina couldn't remember _any_ friends that had gone out of their way for her; she hadn't even known friends did that, save in books and movies.

 _And now I have one, maybe two._

She snapped out of her thoughts as Tamaki whined, "But that doesn't make any _sense!"_

"Suoh-san," said their ruffled instructor with gritted teeth and a forced smile. "I've explained the rule _five times already_."

Tamaki pouted, and Rosina suppressed a giggle.

"But _sensei!"_ he whined. "I don't _get it!"_

Sensei looked like she might pop a blood vessel. Rosina decided that Tamaki deserved some chocolate for this. The boy was unnaturally good at irritating their poor teacher, much to Rosina's joy; the woman was ridiculously condescending, though she was an able teacher.

 _I wonder if he has a nut allergy…maybe I can make him some…_

* * *

"Ne, are you sure you want to be friends with us, Neri-san?" asked Haninozuka the next day, just before entering the school.

Rosina looked at him in surprise, the conversation topic switch a bit odd. "Why would you ask that?" she asked self-consciously. "Do you not want to be friends with me?"

Haninozuka shook his head emphatically. "No, it's not like that! It's just…you might not want to be friends with us, that's all. You might regret it later."

He looked pretty downtrodden when he said it – he would miss having a friend other than Takashi – everyone he had previously been friends with had left him after… _the incident_.

Rosina pouted determinedly. "I will never not want to be friends with you, Haninozuka-san. That's a _promise_."

Her resolve would be tested though, very very soon.

* * *

 _So, Haruhi, eh? This felt like a meh chapter, though let me know what you thought, please? A bit more about her mental state – which will get better, I promise! She'll be more able to be friends with someone she feels inferior to, given time. And the consequences of being friends with social pariahs ought to catch up with her soon enough!_

 _Review please?_


End file.
